For dealers thinking (or perhaps hoping) that social media is a fad that will soon pass, think again, say experts at the Driving Sales Executive Summit held this week in Las Vegas, Nev.
Social media guru Gary Vaynerchuk likes social media because it helps "sell stuff."
The focus of the three-day event is on finding tips and tools to help dealers drive sales and better performance. A roster of industry experts and thought leaders from across North America took the stage to share their insights with the more than 400 assembled delegates at the Bellagio Hotel.
The event is organized by DrivingSales.com, an organization focused on creating learning and educational opportunities for dealers led by Jared Hamilton (who is also Canadian auto dealer‘s newest columnist. Visit http://drivingsalesexecutivesummit.com/ for more event information).
The most impassioned boost for social media came from Gary Vaynerchuk, whose book Crush It! Why Now is the Time to Cash in on your Passion, made it to #2 on the New York Times bestseller list. His keynote speech about the relevance of social media earned him a standing ovation. “I’ve never seen a standing ovation at an automotive conference,” said Hamilton.
The delegates were still buzzing about Vaynerchuk’s presentation the next day. “Incredible,” said one dealer. “Simple truths that make so much sense, but why didn’t I think of that?” Another delegate said: “That might be the best presentation I’ve ever seen.” After his talk, delegates lined up to get signed copies of his latest book “The Thank You Economy.”
Wake up to reality
With a New Jersey accent, and with manic energy, he delivered a profanity-laded presentation without a single note or PowerPoint slide that made everyone sit up and take notice.
Vaynerchuk, (or Gary Vee as delegates referred to him in their live Twitter feeds posted during his presentation), paced the stage and delivered a personal account of how he grew up in New Jersey and laboured in the basement of his father’s liquor store.
His career changing moment came when he discovered some of his father’s customers collected wine. As a former baseball card collector and trader, he figured out that there was an opportunity to serve the wine collector market. He built a business, www.winelibrary.com, and using social media tools such as Twitter and Facebook to promote his video blog about wine, his company experienced explosive growth. His success has made him a sought after speaker, earned him a seven figure book deal, national TV appearances and speaking engagements around the world.
But the reason he had the attention of the dealer crowd is that he made the link between social media and money. Vaynerchuk makes a persuasive argument that social media is a completely transformative technology has already has changed all of our industries — but most of us just don’t recognize it yet. “I have no interest in social media because it’s cool,” he said as he paced around the stage addressing dealers. “I don’t give a crap about Twitter or Facebook or FourSquare. The only reason I care is that social media sells stuff.”
His gritty persona and brutally frank comments easily won over the dealer crowd. Instead of hearing an evangelist praise social media for its community building efforts, or some vague notion of why it’s relevant, he was laser focused on how these new tools drive sales and customer loyalty.
We are living through the single biggest cultural shift of our time, he says. “We are in the eyeballs and ears business,” he says, and attracting those ears and eyeballs is getting harder because people’s focus and attention is divided in so many places. “The people in this room will be out of business unless they understand this.”
Marketing has always been a push medium, where publishers and marketers shove content out to their audience, he says. But social media turns that on its head and the consumer is now in charge and they “pull” the information they want. To succeed in our new age of endless choice, companies need to evolve back to a one-on-one approach to marketing to individuals and not to the masses. “Social media is word of mouth on steroids,” he says.
The change won’t be easy, and many people just won’t get it. “People are buying and making decisions in a completely different way,” he says. “Now marketing is a cocktail party. The skill set of being good at a cocktail party is extremely different. That is where the battleground will begin.”
He said, ironically, that our parents and even grandparents are better equipped to deal with the tools required for social media success, because the etiquette and approach is akin to living in a small town where you know everyone and treat them fairly because you’ll be seeing them again and again. That requires a certain tact and civility that is not easy to master for corporations, particularly large ones.
His company, for example, doesn’t have a customer service department (he deems that as too defensive) but instead has a thank you department. Those individuals find out what makes their customer’s tick and what their interests are, and they send them personalized gifts and thank you notes. One customer, a big Chicago Bears fan, was posting on Twitter about how much he loved the Bears and Jay Cutler. So Vaynerchuk ordered a signed jersey from quarterback Jay Cutler and sent it to his client. These types of personal touches are now a big part of how he conducts his business.
It’s tough to do justice to Vaynerchuk’s presentation without hearing him. He has a passion and an authenticity that wins people over, and they can easily see how society has changed through the examples he provides. If you get a chance and see him speaking at an event, make sure to check him out.
You can find out more about him at his website: http://garyvaynerchuk.com/
Look for more coverage of the Driving Sales Executive Summit in the next issue of Canadian auto dealer.
